Exploring the edges of what is considered vegan. Process contamination, obscure ingredients, and products of unknown composition.
Many people who embrace a vegan lifestyle are satisfied to follow a baseline definition of veganism, such as this one provided by the Vegan Society UK.
One thing all vegans have in common is a plant-based diet avoiding all animal foods such as meat (including fish, shellfish and insects), dairy, eggs and honey - as well as products like leather and any tested on animals.
However, some people want to take a deeper look at the products we produce, and really take veganism to the fullest extent possible as suggested by the core definition.
Veganism is a way of living which seeks to exclude, as far as is possible and practicable, all forms of exploitation of, and cruelty to, animals for food, clothing or any other purpose.
This tag is-it-vegan is for questions that go beyond the baseline of veganism and really explore the edges of is considered vegan. Here are a few categories that these questions fit into.
- Process contamination. Some processing steps use animal parts but leave virtually no trace in the final product. Two common examples are using bone char to bleach sugar and fish bladder to filter wine.
- Accidental contamination such as through processing or cooking.
- Specific ingredient sources and origins. Asking about the source of specific ingredients with unfamiliar names and/or origins in order to determine whether they depend on animal materials.
- Unknown composition. Some products are accidentally vegan, while others appear to be vegan but contain animal ingredients.
Questions bearing this tag will normally also be tagged with veganism
